In previous posts, we’ve discussed the FCC’s Open Internet order, big picture — Title II, no blocking, no throttling, paid prioritization, enhanced consumer transparency, stepped-up enforcement, and renewed scrutiny in Congress and the courts (where it was just announced that appeals of the order would be consolidated in the D.C. Circuit).

The entry summarizes the major elements of the Open Internet Order. An analysis of the FCC’s policy determinations and reasoning for regulating broadband internet access service as a Title II telecommunications service will be provided in a later entry.

The Federal Communications Commission’s (“FCC”) net neutrality proceeding culminated this month with the release of an Order reclassifying broadband Internet access service as a common carrier Telecommunications Service subject to regulation under Title II of the Communications Act.

Yesterday FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai testified before the House Appropriations Committee, and in his lengthy statement, asked that Congress defund the FCC–or at least that part of the FCC that would implement the FCC’s recent net neutrality decision.

The FCC set a new record for a fine for a single violation of its indecency rules – $325,000 for a 3 second visual image of a penis run in a corner of a TV screen a single time on a TV station during its 6 PM news (a full description of the image is in the FCC’s Notice of Apparent Liability but, so as to not trigger too many spam filters, I will omit any more details in this article).

In its recent Open Internet Order (“Order”), the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”) determined that broadband Internet access services are appropriately classified as common carrier “telecommunications services” under the Telecommunications Act of 1996.

Recently, we reported on bills introduced – actually, re-introduced, since proposals with the same language had died during the preceding Congressional session – by several reasonably high-profile Senators and Representatives.